“Adrian,” Monty interrupts, but I have more I want to ask—it feels so urgent I have to press my teeth together to stop myself from talking. It’s all rattling around my brain like dice about to be tossed, and if I don’t give adequate attention to every strange notion—if I miss any of this, leave any stone unturned or question unasked—I’m sure the one that gets away will be the one I regret ignoring. That will be the winning hand I could have thrown.
Monty tugs down the tails of his shirt as a veiled woman passing by grabs her child by both his hands and drags him away from us. “Have you eaten today?” he asks me suddenly.
I wasn’t expecting that. How can he think of anything other than the ghost ship and the spyglass? “I . . . probably.”
“Hold out your hands.”
I do, not sure what he’s looking for, until I notice the tremor. I fist them quickly and shove them into my pockets. “I’m anxious.”
“You’re anxious? At least you’ve got your trousers.” He holds up a hand to shield his face from the sun, scanning the medina street ahead of us. “Why don’t you go find something to eat and I’ll find clothes and we’ll meet back here in half of an hour?”
“No!” I almost grab his arm, grasped by the sudden surety that he’s using this as a ploy to abandon me. Even if it’s not, I can’t be alone right now. Particularly not in an unfamiliar place, and with a responsibility. I want to die at the thought of having to ask “What’s that?” about every item beneath a bakery counter while the shopkeeper laughs behind his hands, then try and work out exchange rates and money while people queue up behind me, growing increasingly annoyed. “Please don’t leave me alone,” I say, trying not to cringe at how pathetic I sound.
Monty sighs and rubs a hand over the back of his neck and I realize he probably wants some time on his own because being around me is an exercise in patience and now he’s even more annoyed than before and I should have just grown a goddamn backbone and got us something to eat, a task literal children are capable of. I almost apologize and tell him not to mind me, but then he tips his head down the street and says, “Come on then—trousers first.”
We don’t share a single language in common with the vendor who sells Monty a wide-legged pair of seaman’s duds, but whether or not he understands the circumstances that led to it, he’s still clearly amused by Monty’s lack of trousers. And, I suspect, hikes the price considerably due to our necessity. Trousers secured, we buy cups of mint tea and flatbread and brochettes—spears of salted meat that are sold off the same grill as steamed sheep heads, which puts me off a smidge—and pastries shaped like horns that smell of orange and cinnamon.
We find a quiet street off the medina and crouch on the stoop of an abandoned shop front to eat. Above us, a palm tree sheds long strips of shredded fronds onto the street each time the wind shifts.
I’m trying to eat—I really am—but my stomach doesn’t feel steady—and not just because of those beady sheep eyes in their severed heads. Monty discovers a hole in the crotch of his brand-new trousers, and I have to remind him three times that picking at it will only make it bigger before he gives up. “Bloody idiot,” he mutters, and I’m not sure if he’s talking about the shopkeeper or himself. Or perhaps me. Probably me.
He wipes his greasy hands on the tail of his shirt, then drains the rest of his tea. “So.” He sets the mug on the ground between us. “Felicity is probably dead.”
I glance over at him. He’s got his elbows resting on his knees and he’s staring hard at the opposite wall of the alley, trying to play it all off as dead casual, but the set of his jaw betrays him.
“That’s not good,” I say quietly.
“Not ideal, no.”
“I’m sorry.”
He massages his shoulder, wincing when he reaches the spot where the manacles rubbed. “It’s disappointing, isn’t it? You don’t realize how much you like someone until they’re marooned and left for dead.”
I hesitate, not sure how much he does or doesn’t want to linger on this subject. “What about Portugal?” I ask tentatively.
He looks sideways at me. “You are still so intent on finding this shipwreck?”
More now than ever, I want to say. Basira Khan had all but confirmed that something about that wreck could haunt a person. Perhaps their whole bloodline.
Monty shoos away a stray cat wandering toward us, its eyes fixed on my untouched brochette. “Weren’t you just explicitly warned by a terrifying woman to go home?”
“She wasn’t terrifying.”
“Intimidating, then. She was intimidating.”
“They’re not the same thing.”
“Definitely not. Though there’s some overlap. Felicity is both intimidating and terrifying. Was. She was. God.” He tears off a strip of his flatbread, staring down the still lingering cat as he eats it, like the eye contact might better convey how our food is very much not for it. “Are you really still going to make me go to goddamn Portugal?”
I slump backward against the wall, unsure if I’m more annoyed that he’s being a prat or that I’m letting it get to me. “I didn’t make you come here.”
“No, you just got lucky I needed a holiday.”
“You don’t have to come to Portugal.”
“But I assume you’re still going.”
I toss a piece of my brochette to the cat, who sniffs it carefully before turning its wide eyes to me as if to say, I’d prefer chicken. “I can take care of myself.”
Monty reaches over and slides the next piece of meat off my skewer. “Course you can. You should have given it to her.”
“The spyglass? She said it didn’t matter.”
“That was absolutely a lie. She changed course because you looked as though you would set someone on fire if they tried to take it from you. Possibly yourself.”
God. Had it been that obvious? Shame soaks into me like a stain. “I’m sorry.”
Monty shrugs, helping himself to another piece of meat. “It worked.”
“I thought she was testing us.” I pass him the rest of the skewer, then hold out my hand for the cat to lick my fingers. “If I’d told her I loved my shoes, she would have asked for them.” Suddenly the weight of the spyglass in my pocket feels so heavy and obvious that everyone who passes by must be staring at me and this treasure hidden in my coat. “Do you think it’s valuable?”
“Against my better judgment, I think it’s . . .” He pauses, chewing. I think he might take another bite to buy himself more time, but then he says, “The Crown and Cleaver doesn’t waste time. If Basira Khan wants it, there’s a reason. I just can’t for the bleeding life of me think of what it might be, and I’m concerned that by the time we work it out, it’ll be too late.”
We sit in silence for a while. A few more cats wander over and similarly turn their noses up at my offering. One gets close enough to lick the inside of Monty’s empty mug before he urges it away with his foot. Every inch of my skin feels irritated, like I’ve been hit by a gust of sandy wind. I scratch my neck, then my arm, then rub my palms against both my thighs, resisting the urge to dig my nails in.